WUNRN
PAKISTAN – CHRISTIAN GIRLS ABDUCTED & FORCED INTO MUSLIM MARRIAGES
May 25,
2015 - The alarming situation of Christian girls in Pakistan has been much
ignored by the media and international community. Every year 700 Christian
girls and women are kidnapped, forced to convert to Islam and are forced to
enter into marriage with Muslims. Under the kidnapper’s custody she may suffer
sexual violence, forced prostitution, domestic abuse and beatings, if not human
trafficking. The young Christian girls are mostly from 12 to 25 years of age
group belonging to poor social class and often rich Muslim landowners take
advantage of such abuse. This estimate is of the officially reported cases the
true extent of the problem is much bigger since many cases are not reported due
to cultural boundaries and fear of honor destruction. These stereotypes have
destroyed many lives because victims are taught to be silent as the word will
spread defaming the family’s and community’s name. Often complaints are not
filed due to fear of threats. A few complaints that come to the courts of the
girls that are intimidated and abused claim to have converted and married
freely, and the case is closed. Claims are changed when Husbands threaten to do
the same with other female family members or to kill the whole family.
In 2013 three Pakistani Muslim men kidnapped a 15 year old
Christian girl, Shama after having an argument with her father over converting
to Islam. When her father, Nasir Masih went to a local police station along
with other Christians to register a complaint against the three men he was told
that his daughter has embraced Islam and is now married to Umar Asghar, one of
the three Muslim men. Police humiliated Nasir Masih along with other local
Christians, threatening to put them in jail if they came back. The victim was
rescued after a group of influential Muslims and an NGO came to her aid. She
reported being raped and tortured many times. We can only hope for the justice
of these minor Christian girls. The damage done to her may haunt her for the
rest of her life and yet the offender may be roaming around freely using power
and influence. Pakistan will remain an illiterate country until it learns to
respects its women, a country where minors like Shama are abducted, raped and
tortured stands as an example of failing state.
Abductions, forced marriages and conversions have become a
disturbing trend in Pakistan, authorities rarely take action and the girls are
never returned to their families. If the girls are raped and become pregnant,
it is nearly impossible for the courts to release them from their captors. If
some girls do manage to escape her Muslim family and attempts to return to
Christianity she is considered an apostate and is liable to be killed, despite
the fact that she was forcibly converted to Islam in the first place. Rape is
being used as a weapon of persecution against Christian girls in Pakistan,
Christian girls are treated as third-class citizens and are expected to commit
to low paying jobs only. In the Islamic republic of Pakistan Christian girls
are particularly vulnerable to these types of crimes because Muslim authorities
are reluctant to protect them when their rights are being violated by the same
Muslims.
Isn’t it ironic when often authorities close cases after the victims claim out of deadly fear, that they converted by their own will? Isn’t it obvious that their violent Muslim husbands have tortured them enough to scare them for lying? Their logic gets blinded when it comes to thinking that was it necessary for the victim to convert to Islam before marrying, why did the man not marry her without involving a conversion? It is done to make sure that victims are not left with many options. If they think of going back to Christianity they are ought to be killed anyway for apostasy. At the age of learning, growing and just being normal girls, seven hundred Christian girls are abducted, raped, tortured, forced into marriages and converted to Islam.